Alan Sears – författare

This book closely examines the pedagogical possibilities of integrating the arts into history curriculum at the secondary and post-secondary levels.

-- Gary Kinsman, author of The Regulation of Desire: Homo and Hetero Sexualities

In recent years a number of popular books have savaged religion arguing it is a dangerous delusion that poisons human societies and relationships. This is but the most recent manifestation of a secularising agenda that has been sweeping contemporary democratic societies since the Enlightenment. This book pushes back against that agenda, examining its key assumptions and arguing that the exclusion of religious people and ideas from education and the public square is both undemocratic and unwise.For the most part the book draws arguments and examples from Christianity, the religious tradition of the authors, but it recognises that many religions share the concerns and possibilities examined. The book examines contemporary expressions of the secularising agenda in Western democracies with particular focus on how that is played out in education. It demonstrates how republican theory understood within a faith perspective provides a shared understanding and substantive basis for education within a Western democracy. It explores the historical connections and disconnections between religion and civic life in the West from ancient to contemporary times and examines religiously based civic action and pedagogical approaches contending both have the potential to contribute greatly to democracy. It will be of value to any who are interested in exploring how democracies can include the voices of all their citizens: the religious and the secular.

In recent years a number of popular books have savaged religion arguing it is a dangerous delusion that poisons human societies and relationships. This is but the most recent manifestation of a secularising agenda that has been sweeping contemporary democratic societies since the Enlightenment. This book pushes back against that agenda, examining its key assumptions and arguing that the exclusion of religious people and ideas from education and the public square is both undemocratic and unwise.For the most part the book draws arguments and examples from Christianity, the religious tradition of the authors, but it recognises that many religions share the concerns and possibilities examined. The book examines contemporary expressions of the secularising agenda in Western democracies with particular focus on how that is played out in education. It demonstrates how republican theory understood within a faith perspective provides a shared understanding and substantive basis for education within a Western democracy. It explores the historical connections and disconnections between religion and civic life in the West from ancient to contemporary times and examines religiously based civic action and pedagogical approaches contending both have the potential to contribute greatly to democracy. It will be of value to any who are interested in exploring how democracies can include the voices of all their citizens: the religious and the secular.

The past decade has seen an explosion of interest in civics and citizenship education. There have been unprecedented developments in citizenship education taking place in schools, adult education centers, or in the less formally structured spaces of media images and commentary around the world. This book provides an overview of the development of civics and citizenship education policy across a range of nation states. The contributors, all widely respected scholars in the field of civics and citizenship education, provide a thorough understanding of the different ways in which citizenship has been taken up by educators, governments and the wider public. Citizenship is never a single given, unproblematic concept, but rather its meanings have to be worked through and developed in terms of the particularities of socio-political location and history. This volume promotes a wider and more grounded understanding of the ways in which citizenship education is enacted across different nation states in order to develop education for active and participatory citizenry in both local and global contexts.

The past decade has seen an explosion of interest in civics and citizenship education. There have been unprecedented developments in citizenship education taking place in schools, adult education centers, or in the less formally structured spaces of media images and commentary around the world. This book provides an overview of the development of civics and citizenship education policy across a range of nation states. The contributors, all widely respected scholars in the field of civics and citizenship education, provide a thorough understanding of the different ways in which citizenship has been taken up by educators, governments and the wider public. Citizenship is never a single given, unproblematic concept, but rather its meanings have to be worked through and developed in terms of the particularities of socio-political location and history. This volume promotes a wider and more grounded understanding of the ways in which citizenship education is enacted across different nation states in order to develop education for active and participatory citizenry in both local and global contexts.

'Takes social reproduction feminism and queer Marxism in exciting new directions' - Peter Drucker, author of WarpedOur deeply human drive to shape the world around us and fulfill ourselves through labor is subverted by capitalist alienation, leaving us to find fulfillment elsewhere.As a result, our erotic drives become the central focus for transformation and life-making, but are themselves restricted and fueled by whatever energy is left after completing the monetized or social reproductive work required to survive. This alienation encounters ongoing resistance, as life-making activity can never be fully separated from the person who labors.Eros and Alienation delves into the underexplored relationship between alienated labor and sexuality. Alan Sears explores the ways this alienation frames the processes of gender and sexual formation, showing how the organization of work contributes to the development of a dominant regime of gendered sexualities, defined by a binary gender mapping of desire as heterosexual, homosexual, or bisexual.

'Globalization' and 'the Nation' provide significant contexts for examining past educational thinking and practice and to identify how education has been influenced today. This book, written collaboratively, explores country case studies - Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, the UK and USA as well as discussing the transnational European Union.

This highly original and compelling book offers an introduction to the art and science of social inquiry, including the theoretical and methodological frameworks that support that inquiry. The new edition offers coverage of post-modernism and Indigenous ways of knowing, as well as a discussion of the research process and how to communicate arguments effectively. The result is a book that blends the best of earlier editions with updates that provide a strong foundation in critical thinking, rooted in the social sciences but relevant across disciplines.

Democracy is very much an open question in the early twenty-first century. While voter participation declines in many traditional democracies, new movements for democracy are emerging around the world. This book brings the question of democracy out of the halls of political power and home to our daily lives, pitting "official democracy" and "democracy from below" against one another in a lively debate.For more information see www.democraticimagination.com.

Rescuing Reason tackles the pressing crisis of civic engagement and public deliberation, drawing on Canadian and international examples, with a particular emphasis on Canada’s democratic landscape. The book argues that K-12 public education has become too narrowly focused on utilitarian aims – such as financial literacy and job preparation – at the expense of the humanities, especially history. Educators Alan Sears and Carla L. Peck contend that this shift has undermined the cultivation of well-rounded citizens equipped for meaningful participation in civic life.This book proposes that a renewed emphasis on history education, taught with depth and rigour, can foster civic reason, empathy, and a shared sense of civic truth. Through detailed frameworks and practical approaches, the book outlines how history can be taught to develop students’ abilities in civic reasoning and engagement, ultimately strengthening democracy.Rescuing Reason makes a compelling case for the vital role of history education in nurturing civic competencies. The book offers a clear, actionable plan for educators, policymakers, and the public to reorient education towards preparing students not just for the workforce, but for active, thoughtful citizenship in a complex democratic society.

The Next New Left explores the challenge of activist renewal in the age of austerity. Over the past few decades, state policy-makers and employers have engaged in a massive process of neo-liberal restructuring that has undermined the basis for social and labour movements. In this book, Alan Sears seeks to understand the social environment that made activist mobilization possible - and was largely taken for granted - during the twentieth century. Just as the neo-liberal era has restructured the very foundations of our lives, so too has it undermined the previously existing infrastructure of dissent, meaning that renewal in social movements will depend on the development of new forms of activist capacity-building. The low frequency of social struggles and mass protests in today's society exposes the need for new work by activists and theorists to confront neo-liberalism and austerity head-on, and to understand the basis of activism and the possibilities of its renewal.By examining social movements of the past, Sears's analysis focuses on the means through which activists develop the capacity for solidarity, communication and demonstration and provides readers with possibilities for a renewal of activism in response to the deteriorating living conditions caused by the ongoing austerity offensive.

This book closely examines the pedagogical possibilities of integrating the arts into history curriculum at the secondary and post-secondary levels.